In addition to a new NFL football stadium, MLB ballpark, and NBA basketball arena, the plan includes 5,750 units of housing, three hotels, over 500,000 square feet of retail space, and nearly 7 million square feet of science, technology, office, and industrial space in the area bounded by 66th Avenue to the north, San Leandro Street on the east, Hegenberger Road on the south, and San Leandro Bay and the Oakland International Airport to the west.

As envisioned, the Coliseum Area would have around 7,000 residents and 20,000 new jobs by the year 2035 when the build-out would be complete and the project would revitalize “what is currently one of California’s largest underdeveloped inner-urban, transit-served areas.”

Public hearings on the Coliseum City Plan and its Draft Environmental Impact Report will be held at Oakland’s City Hall on September 8 and October 1. In the works for the past two years and developed at a cost of well over $5 million, the original goal of the plan was to keep the Warriors, A’s and Raiders at the Coliseum site.

Recent Articles

Comments from “Plugged-In” Readers

Fab bold proposal — if ever there were momentum for OakLand to come into its own it is now. Like the density and mixed uses. Can’t tell where Brooklyn Basin dev is in relationship. Also unclear how the waterways will accommodate ferry or taxi svc to city Peninsula and other points.

I’m hoping since her name was Krackowski it was a joke or troll or something. Otherwise wow, just wow. And my wife works in Alameda and I work in San Mateo so we’re settled in southern part of SF as a mid point. But we both would have seriously considered North Oakland areas like Rockridge or Grand Lakes area. Despite the hell scape Jane Krackowski has described. But I don’t really see this project as a real possibility.

So, this plan includes the Warriors staying (which isn’t happening) and the Raiders staying (which is also possibly not happening, so will it still work as planned with just a baseball stadium? Which, if San Jose wins their court battle against the MLB, will the A’s still be around?

I love these Let’s-Play-Pretend-that-Oakland-Could-Actually-Get-it’s Sh*t-Together to build so much as an ashtray. Like the new Ghetto on the Lake, covered in trash and graffiti every weekend? Oakland is one of the most under-utilized, waiting-to-be an awesome place dumps that ain’t never going to happen. Good luck and I hope your sketch-up guys are getting paid. Sorry: seen too little for too long over there. Prove me wrong.

Thank you! I’ve worked by the lake for 12 years. It was never that bad even back in 2002, but, the improvement that has taken place since is remarkable. Of course Oakland is rough around the edges, but, the amount of people out late at night and on the weekends is comparable to any neighborhood in SF.

I’d have agreed with you at one time – I lived in Oakland for 8 LONG years, and ejected with both middle fingers pointed East when my rent there doubled over the course of a year. But in the 10ish years I’ve been in SF, it’s changed a lot. When I’m over there these days it’s downright nice, and not just around the lake, where it was nice before. Bars & restaurants are popping up like mushrooms, it’s a younger & less snotty scene over there, and for better or worse, property values are exploding. We could get a MUCH bigger, more awesome place over there for what our place here is worth, and be surrounded by more creatives to boot.

So , 2 years in the making , and $5 million dollars spent ,
Its like being the parents of some crazed girl who still wants to plan her wedding and reserve spaces the week after her fiance broke up with her ,,

someone needs to be fired for having this take 2 years , and for not having this done with all the ownership organization and agencies at the table

I’m glad that you doubt this will happen and honestly the doubt is reasonable but take into consideration that Oakland is still in the 8th largest television market and 5th largest real estate market in the country based off average tax revenue in this region compared to other markets. It can happen if Lew Wolfe, Mark Davis, and (which I doubt) Warriors ownership can work with the city to bring in the funds. Between them owners and the city, it can definitely happen.

A project of this magnitude is a long shot even in an American city with an effective local government, a functioning civic life, a healthy business environment, and a population consisting largely of productive and responsible citizens. But this is Oakadishu we’re talking about. Never a chance in hell.

It is a long shot, as most major development projects are. You need to know you’ve got Oakland all wrong -perhaps too much SFGate in your life? Oakland has some of the lowest commercial and industrial vacancy rates in the US, one of the highest hotel occupancy rates, and most metros envy our residential rental market. We have a very active civic life here, almost too active (and a little too left). While Oakland takes up for most of Alameda County’s deficient affordable housing stock, Oakland’s poverty rate is only ~3% higher than the state average. You’ve got Oakland wrong.

Many folks have said variations on the same thing, but my observation as someone who knows many of the players involved:

1) Sadly the entire exercise is motivated NOT by what can realistically improve Oakland in the short/medium term, but by pie in the sky thinking. The prime movers of this effort are politically connected and “visionary” architects who don’t understand squat about economics or transportation or the regulatory environment (bay fill anyone? ugh!)

2) A prime motivation is to have something…anything…to convince a ball team to stay. That’s window dressing politically (we’ve done everything we could), but there is SOME reality in having an approved environmental document to make things move fast if the Raiders are game to play (or the Warriors deal completely falls apart which seems unlikely).

3) You can’t forget the racial politics angle…the City of Oakland needs to do something to prove that it’s not ignoring East Oakland. Pretty plans can do that, and it definitely works into Mayoral politics.

This plan is going nowhere. The City would be far better served by working convincingly on a new 10K plan for downtown, streamlining approvals for infill development and taking advantage of a real opportunity to cement the gains that were made under Jerry Browns administration and take advantage of a remarkable moment to grab the overflow from SF and reposition downtown Oakland. However, the political leadership of Oakland is inept and divided, and whatever good is happening is happening despite that leadership rather than because of it.

To truly revitalize this area in an efficient manner, the concept should be grand and capture a large land mass, as this proposal seems to do. Unfortunately, however, this concept and variations of it have been floating around for at least 10 years, most recently with the now-defunct Oakland Redevelopment Agency.

With the possible exception of housing (even that would be highly risky since this is not an established neighborhood for market rate, vertical housing, with little in the way of nearby amenities) the commercial side of the development would not appear to command rates nearly sufficient to justify construction costs. For example, the beautiful, first generation office space for Zhone across the street has sat mostly empty for the last decade.

Of course, it is easier to point out problems than solutions. More likely would be some sort of big box retail which would not fit the more elegant vision being proposed and has, in any event, previously resisted this side of the freeway.

Not sure where you travel, but among US airports without a direct line into the terminal (ala BART at SFO, CTA at ORD, Link LRT at SEA, MAX to PDX, etc) and for which there is obviously a fare, AirTrain at JFK charges $5, AirTrain at EWR charges $5.50, SEPTA charges an $8.00 fare on their airport line into PHL….

The charge is not for BART but for riding the connection TO BART. There is no charge to ride the OHARE train between terminals, parking lots and CTA station, that is free of charge. If we are going to encourage people to use transit, we should not charge them an extra $6 to ride to a transit station. BTW- my friends just got a rental car for 7 days for $135 from SFO with unlimited mileage. How can transit costs compete with their rate? They can take their rented Prius anywhere in Northern California, and they will to.

Yes, as Mark points out we already pay $4 extra (above and beyond BART’s base rate) to go to SFO. You may well think that is short sighted, given that we should want to maximize ridership to the airport. However, the BART board decided to do that on much the same basis that cities like to raise hotel taxes: it’s perceived as soaking the out of towners and business travelers more than the normal joe schmo. They first imposed a small surcharge, and then increased it significantly during the recession as a way to balance the budget. Now with the Oakland Airport connector, it needs to be “fair”, and local advocates like TransForm are screaming that the connection should not be subsidized and hurt other transit service, so they’re pressured into a higher cost. Obviously it will have a ridership impact…it will be interesting to see what ridership is. My own feeling is that both SFO and Oakland Airport Connector should have the same fare basis as any other BART service.